Thesis: Melamed, Israeli Homemade Video Memorials and the Politics of Loss

Melamed, Laliv. Sovereign Intimacy: Israeli Homemade Video Memorials and the Politics of Loss, PhD dissertation. New York: New York University, 2015.
 
URL: http://gradworks.umi.com/37/40/3740826.html
 
Abstract

Sovereign Intimacy takes as its subject of investigation video memorialization of dead Israeli soldiers done by their close family and friends. Mixing private loss, home-made video production, military conduct, state politics, and an institutionalized commemoration, it redraws the affinities between affective intimacy and forms of governing. It delineates the reshaping of sovereignty by filial relationships, video practicing and aesthetics, state and military administration of death and mass media. Sovereign Intimacy inquires into the political currencies of mourning and loss.

The videos respond to an event triggered by operations of state violence—figured by military power—with a personal lamenting of the breaking of intimate ties. These videos are made by the family and for the family, through amateur and semi-amateur modes of production. Although they were meant to be privately circulated, this phenomenon emerged in tandem to the videos being broadcast on television during the events of the National Memorial Day.

Home-made video memorials become a standard of Israeli memorialization during the 1990s. Largely the result of waning public support of the Israeli occupation of the south of Lebanon, and of a growing disavowal of state authority, the phenomenon represented a potential challenge to hegemonic narratives and aesthetic forms, through the appropriation of memory and means of production. However, it did not make way to a new political voice to emerge. Instead, these videos emotionalized violence and victimized its deliverers. Furthermore, the broadcasting of the videos on television—allegedly as a tribute to the families, a communal gesture of listening and a call for solidarity—participated in a national economy of death in which the lives of Lebanese, Palestinians and marginalized people within Israeli society had no value. Lastly, the phenomenon of memorial videos normalized the growing militarization of civil society and neutralized any call for political action.

 

 

 

New Article: Omer & Zafrir-Reuven, The Development of Street Patterns in Israeli Cities

Omer, Itzhak, and Orna Zafrir-Reuven. “The Development of Street Patterns in Israeli Cities.” Journal of Urban and Regional Analysis 7.2 (2015): 113-27.

ְְ 

URL: http://www.jurareview.ro/2015_7_2/a1_72.pdf [PDF]

 

Abstract

Street patterns of Israeli cities were investigated by comparing three time periods of urban development: (I) the late 19th century until the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948; (II) 1948 until the 1980s; and (III) the late 1980s until the present. These time periods are related respectively to the pre-modern, modern and late-modern urban planning approach. Representative urban street networks were examined in selected cities by means of morphological analysis of typical street pattern properties: curvature, fragmentation, connectivity, continuity and differentiation. The study results reveal significant differences between the street patterns of the three examined periods in the development of cities in Israel. The results show clearly the gradual trends in the intensification of curvature, fragmentation, complexity and hierarchical organization of street networks as well as the weakening of the network’s internal and external connectivity. The implications of these changes on connectivity and spatial integration are discussed with respect to planning approaches.

 

 

 

New Article: Peffley et al, The Impact of Persistent Terrorism on Political Tolerance

Peffley, Mark, Marc L. Hutchison, and Michal Shamir. “The Impact of Persistent Terrorism on Political Tolerance: Israel, 1980 to 2011.” American Political Science Review 109.4 (2015): 817-32.

ְְ 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0003055415000441

 

Abstract

How do persistent terrorist attacks influence political tolerance, a willingness to extend basic liberties to one’s enemies? Studies in the U.S. and elsewhere have produced a number of valuable insights into how citizens respond to singular, massive attacks like 9/11. But they are less useful for evaluating how chronic and persistent terrorist attacks erode support for democratic values over the long haul. Our study focuses on political tolerance levels in Israel across a turbulent 30-year period, from 1980 to 2011, which allows us to distinguish the short-term impact of hundreds of terrorist attacks from the long-term influence of democratic longevity on political tolerance. We find that the corrosive influence of terrorism on political tolerance is much more powerful among Israelis who identify with the Right, who have also become much more sensitive to terrorism over time. We discuss the implications of our findings for other democracies under threat from terrorism.

 

 

 

Conference paper: Moskovich, Ramon’s Leadership in the new Israeli Labor Union

Moskovich, Yaffa. “Ramon’s Leadership in the new Israeli Labor Union: The Histadrut.” European Conference on Management, Leadership & Governance (November 2015).

 
URL: http://search.proquest.com/openview/d52d59af091005feb53467157ab3e094/1
 
Abstract

In Israel, the old Histadrut, or organization of trade unions, was founded as a welfare agency, it employed about one third of the labor force, and it was the dominant health-service provider, primarily funded by insurance premiums. As a socialist entity, the Histadrut was linked politically and economically to the Labor Party, which helped fund it while in power. The old Histadrut was managed on a political basis, and suffered from organizational decline, including huge debts and economic bankruptcy in most of its institutions and assets. In 1994, a new leader, Haim Ramon, was elected to run the organization. Acting against union members, Ramon transformed the Histadrut into a confederation of autonomous labor unions, selling off Histadrut enterprises and assets to private investors, and severing all political ties. This paper demonstrates the unusual union leadership style of Ramon, who downsized, weakened, and destroyed the Israeli union, while most union leaders act to empower their organization.

 

 

 

New Book: Tabansky and Ben-Israel, Cybersecurity in Israel

Tabansky, Lior, and Isaac Ben Israel. Cybersecurity in Israel. New York: Springer, 2015.

This SpringerBrief gives the reader a detailed account of how cybersecurity in Israel has evolved over the past two decades. The formation of the regions cybersecurity strategy is explored and an in-depth analysis of key developments in cybersecurity policy is provided.
The authors examine cybersecurity from an integrative national perspective and see it as a set of policies and actions with two interconnected goals: to mitigate security risks and increase resilience and leverage opportunities enabled by cyber-space.
Chapters include an insight into the planning and implementation of the National Security Concept strategy which facilitated the Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) agreement in 2002, (one of the first of its kind), the foundation of the Israeli Cyber-strategy in 2011, and details of the current steps being taken to establish a National Cyber Security Authority (NCSA).
Cybersecurity in Israel will be essential reading for anybody interested in cyber-security policy, including students, researchers, analysts and policy makers alike.

 

Table of Contents

Introduction
Pages 1-8

Geopolitics and Israeli Strategy
Pages 9-14

The National Innovation Ecosystem of Israel
Pages 15-30

Mid-1990s: The Prequel for National Cybersecurity Policy
Pages 31-34

The Israeli National Cybersecurity Policy Focuses on Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP)
Pages 35-41

Seeking Cyberpower: The National Cyber Initiative, 2010
Pages 43-48

The National Cyber-Strategy of Israel and the INCB
Pages 49-54

Towards Comprehensive National Cybersecurity
Pages 55-61

Striking with Bits? The IDF and Cyber-Warfare
Pages 63-69

Conclusion: From Cybersecurity to Cyberpower
Pages 71-73

 

 

Reviews: de Búrca, Preventing Political Violence Against Civilians

de Búrca, Aoibhín. Preventing Political Violence Against Civilians. Nationalist Militant Conflict in Northern Ireland, Israel And Palestine. Basingstoke, UK and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.

Reviews

• McGrattan, Cillian.”Review.” Democracy and Security 11.3 (2015): 326-7.
• Jarrett, Henry. “Review.” Nations and Nationalism 22.1 (2016): 186-199.

 

 

New Article: Aharony, The Reception of Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night in Israel

Aharony, Michal. “Nihilism and Antisemitism: The Reception of Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night in Israel.” Rethinking History 19.1 (2015): 111-32.

 

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13642529.2014.913936

 

Abstract

Louis-Ferdinand Céline is considered one of the most pro-Nazi, antisemitic writers in Europe. In 1994, an intense controversy arose in Israel after the decision to translate into Hebrew and publish his novel, Journey to the End of the Night. The heated debate soon went beyond the question of the book’s publication. This essay analyzes Céline’s reception in Israel, and more specifically, the controversy that erupted over the translation of Journey. It argues that while this debate was relatively minor in the context of the heated polemics on the Holocaust, it nevertheless has significant implications on both contemporary public discourse on the Holocaust and the limits of political criticism in Israel. Israeli intellectual discourse is framed, to a large extent, I contend, within the borders of Auschwitz, a metaphor for the borders of consciousness of many Jewish-Israelis, from both the left and the right. To this day, the trauma of the Holocaust is still present in Israeli society in a way that determines what is legitimate to read, discuss, and disagree with. Furthermore, by examining the different voices in this controversy, I demonstrate how the Israeli ‘Céline affair’ in the mid-1990s moves us away from the overstated positions of the major debates, and sheds new light on the specter of the Holocaust in Israel in seemingly non-political discussions of culture, art, and leisure. The political underpinnings of the Céline controversy, I conclude, are not clear or clear cut, and are not defined by the traditional political camps in Israel. The implication is that public Holocaust debates represent an autonomous field, subordinated to no political party dictates, and yet are still political. The public debate that followed the translation of Journey serves as a watershed. It shows us how at the end of every political–cultural divide in Israeli society, we arrive at ‘Auschwitz’ as a metaphor for the existential threat.